


The Physics of Glitter

by TheDivineComedian



Series: Finding Sabine [2]
Category: Star Wars: Rebels
Genre: Space family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-17
Updated: 2017-05-17
Packaged: 2018-11-02 00:10:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 13,996
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10932894
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheDivineComedian/pseuds/TheDivineComedian
Summary: Sabine has been with the Spectres for a month. Still devastated from her best friend's betrayal, she's struggling to find her place in the crew. But in the aftermath of a botched operation, it turns out she has more in common with Kanan than either of them thought. Space family angst with some resolve.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> (Originally posted to ff.net on 04-22-17.)
> 
> I wanted to write a story where the teen protagonist is actually being a teen (but also an exceptional fighter and weapons expert, because Star Wars Rebels). Who has serious issues. Also, a story in which the fit people actually have to work out, because that's only fair. Lastly, the title is not just for fun; the physics of glitter are very important to the plot, okay.

So this is Lothal.

Kind of a dump, really. Nothing like Mandalore. Certainly nothing like Mandalore used to be in the Great Age, before the civil war. Sabine would bet that Lothal never even had a Great Age. Old Republic, Clone Wars, Galactic Empire, whatever-comes-next: Just one never-ending Dump Age for Lothal.

Hot dump, though.

Removing her armour, Sabine feels an absurd mix of relieved and exposed, even in the privacy of her own cabin. But it has been twelve months spent mostly in space – twelve disastrous months, or to be fair, eleven brilliant months, and one _really_ disastrous month. After that much time in the climate-controlled, slightly chilled environment of spaceships, she longs to feel the warmth of a sun, any sun, on her skin. Wind in her face rather than recycled air out of a ventilation vent, a blue sky overhead rather than artificial light from a panel. That sort of thing. Lothal will do.

There's another thing. The armour is now the only possession she has left from her past, and seeing it from the outside as it hangs down from the hook on the wall, she feels like leaving herself behind, still and vulnerable. And with people she's only known for a month, at that.

Like most things, it's not _only_ scary. Having nothing, owning nothing, it's like a reset.

The tank top and shorts she's wearing are hand-me-downs from Hera. Similarly, her hair's current shade of bright turquoise is the result of a chemical reaction involving leftover Anti-Freeze, which provided the colour, and the mineral salt solution Hera uses to clean the contacts in the sublight calibration system, which provided the permanence. Even the mini blaster she's now tucking into the back of her shorts isn't her own. It has been liberated from behind the backrest of the co-pilot's seat, Kanan's favourite lounging spot.

Next to Hera.

Meaning?

She decides not to think about this now, and rushes out; not in the measured, relaxed pace she'd pictured – like an adult, but a _cool_ adult – but in a skippity-hoppity, rattling-into-doors, actually-looking-forward-to-this, tumble.

Of course, they're outside, Kanan and Hera, unloading crates of supplies that contain fuel, pressed meal bars, barrels of fresh water (good, she'll need a shower later). Overhead, Zeb is on the lookout for trouble. Chopper is repairing a small defect on the backboard hyperdrive motivator – the same defect that made them divert for Corellia, where they found Sabine in a debris field behind the moon. She owes that defect her life.

For a second, she just watches Kanan and Hera from the airlock. They're not even speaking, but of course the unloading goes seamlessly. Kanan is still putting away a toolbox while Hera throws him a new, sealed medpack – they'd used up the old one, on Sabine. He is not even looking, but turns around and catches the medpack anyway. Does he have eyes in the back of his head?

A memory comes up without asking: Unloading supplies with Ketsu had been a different affair. Always talking, shouting, bad-mouthing whichever insignificant moon they'd found themselves on this time. It would have taken all day, and while Ketsu would have probably thrown things at her when she'd had her back turned, too, Sabine definitely, definitely would have dropped that medpack. But there'd have been more laughter, too.

She probably shouldn't be staring at Hera and Kanan, but damn it, it's been a month and she still hasn't figured it out. Are these two an item or not?

Here's one piece of evidence: Only last night, on a trip from her cabin to the 'fresher, she'd run into Kanan in the hall. The only two places he could have come from were a) the machine room (at three in the morning? Mid-flight, with all systems green, and the hyperdrive humming smoothly?) or b) Hera's cabin (which, again, begs the question: at three in the morning? Had Hera thrown him out? Does he snore?). He'd merely said, 'Good morning," without a hint of surprise at Sabine's presence in the hall. But then, what had she expected, a wink? Not from Mr Sabaccface.

Too late, she realises Mr Sabaccface is looking up at her. As always, he gives off the impression he's already figured out everything there is to know about her. We'll, he's in for a few surprises.

"Where are _you_ going?" he says.

"Out," she says, a tad more aggressively than intended. But the, what is it to him? She can go where she wants, she thinks, leaping down the ramp. Daring him to snap back.

He shrugs. "Have fun."

"…'kay," she answers, a bit deflated, heading towards the exit of the landing pit. She doesn't even know why she feels so irritated all of a sudden. High time she got rid of some of that energy.

Her glorious getaway is ruined when she doesn't immediately remember the keycode. Just out, Sabine! Out! No staring at the doorlock, muttering curses!

"Hey, Sabine?" Kanan calls after her.

She turns. Tries to appear unfazed. "Yeah?"

Both Kanan and Hera looking at her now. Great. "I think we've got this between the two of us," Kanan says, meaning himself and Hera. "So how about you take Zeb along?"

"Think I can't handle myself?" she shoots back.

"Of course you can," says Kanan in his most reassuring tone, and doesn't it sound a little patronising, too. "But we think Zeb could do with the exercise."

"Hey!" interjects the Lasat from somewhere up above.

Oh god, Sabine realises belatedly. Did they want _privacy_? Not on her watch, she thinks with a certain amount of cattiness.

And anyway, how does he know? How does Kanan _always_ know what she's up to?

She smirks, for once exerts full control over her face. "Why don't you ask me to take the droid while you're at it?" she asks. "At least Chopper has a jetpack."

"Missy, _you_ 'll need a jetpack if you don't watch it!" roars Zeb.

"You've got to catch me first," she shouts back. Oh, she _likes_ him. At least Zeb treats her like an equal. Like an equal enemy, granted, but they're getting there.

In the glory of that exchange, she finally remembers the keycode.

Kanan shrugs. "Suit yourself," he says. "At least you found my spare blaster. Very responsible, taking a blaster."

Head held high, Sabine walks through the exit. From somewhere deep in her mind, the impulse to slam the door emerges. But the door isn't made for that, she has to wait for it to close automatically. Then she breathes out. All in all, the conversation is not a total loss, she decides – points awarded for the banter with Zeb, points deducted for potentially sounding like an obnoxious teen.

Finally on the road, she picks a side at random, dashes off, or tries to. Sabine is almost fifteen minutes into her run before her brain finally stops going around in circles, replaying the short conversation from earlier, thinking up a thousand rebuttals, all while dodging pedestrians, running tangents around market stalls, and giving any Stormtrooper postings a wide berth. Finally she leaves the outskirts of the city, right into the dry, rocky plains. It's mid-afternoon now and already the shadows are growing longer, but on the horizon, over the mountains, the air still shimmers with heat. After the bustling city, the view is quite peaceful, especially for a dump like this.

Gradually, the mental hamster wheel stops as the terrain gets rougher. She likes it. Jumping from rock to rock on the uneven ground, she feels the strength returning to her legs, her feet, all those countless muscles stabilising her body. She is going to be so sore tomorrow, and her skin is already sticky with sweat and dust.

Oh yeah.

One thought at a time, finally. How had Kanan known she was going for a run? They'd been on the _Ghost_. No place for running, and she hadn't really talked about her hobbies. Or anything else. Maybe it had been simple deduction: Agility and strength like hers didn't just happen, they had to be worked for, and she was used to working hard for it.

But during her short time on the _Ghost_ , it had hardly been a habit. At first, she'd still been in convalescence, but even after, there was just so much jumping up and down a stack of crates and doing pullups on her bunk – on her own, without Ketsu pushing her – that she could do before being bored to tears. Plus, she'd hardly seen the point: Being fit hadn't saved her last time, after all. So she'd let it slide, and boy was she paying the price right now.

But all that meant Kanan must have really paid attention to her. She doesn't know how to feel about that.

Now, her whole body is at work as she leaps down a short but steep incline, jumping from jagged rock to jagged rock. No time for thinking, she lets her reflexes decide where to land her feet. After all, good reflexes don't come out of nowhere. No time to think about what'll happen if she face-plants, breaks a leg or her skull.

At the foot of the hillside, she stands still for a minute, wipes the sweat out of her eyes, and the hair currently plastered to her forehead out of her face. She doesn't usually rest on a run, but today she is already close to wiped out, and only half-way. She's out of breath, her heart is pumping hard, her hands are swollen with heat. Feeling on top of the world.

At the academy, there had been no time for any of this. They'd had focused, intense workout sessions designed to train their coordination, close-combat skills, and willingness to suffer, but the bulk of their physical fitness training had been via myoelectrical and cardiovascular stimulation. Maximum efficiency, because someone had realised they could train and watch training videos at the same time – sublight navigation algorithms, or crowd control techniques. Sabine remembers learning everything there was to know about exothermic reactions while drenched in sweat, her heart drumming in her ears. The Empire did not waste time.

The sun is already low, sure sign that Sabine is jolly well succeeding in wasting time today. Sticking it to the Empire, one long run at a time.

Suddenly, a different thought occurs in her dehydrated brain. Should she have offered her help, back at the _Ghost_? It had hardly seemed necessary, with Hera and Kanan being such a well-rehearsed team, and they'd _said_ they'd got this, and anyway, Zeb hadn't helped, either, he'd just been sitting on top of the _Ghost_ with a rifle. And if they had needed help, they could have just asked.

And Sabine isn't even a member of the crew, not really. Sure, they'd picked her up and patched her up, and called her _Spectre Five_ during a tense situation when they had navigated orbit over Lothal, but that had been for anonymity.

_Spectre Five_. Even the droid comes before her!

She'd just hitched a ride, that's what this is. She'll repay it as soon as she gets some sort of income, and she's got a wide array of marketable skills. Looking at this dump, she'd probably have to hitch another ride, just to get off Lothal and into slightly more relevant regions of the galaxy, where her talents will shine. Where she will be trusted.

_Trusted_. She sighs.

Like Ketsu should have trusted her. Like Sabine shouldn't have trusted Ketsu.

It's the asymmetry of the whole thing that makes this so hard to bear. She could have stayed on top of it, had she not been so naive, so _childish_. She'd believed in what they had, and she'd believed too much. The thought has been on a slow burn for a month, and it's still ongoing. Maybe one day she'll stop feeling pathetic. Maybe not. Maybe not feeling _anything_ would be a good start.

Sabine throws a rock high up in the air and blasts it into smithereens, but unsurprisingly, it doesn't make her feel better. So she climbs back up the hillside and runs back, kicking up her pace just a notch on the plains, towards where the spaceport looms on the horizon, fleeing the creeping shadows from the mountains and her own jumbled thoughts.

* * *

Her legs are shaking when she reaches the landing pit. A rational voice inside her points out that a mere four weeks ago she'd been twirling her thumbs in a bacta tank, and she's allowed to be fatigued. But welcome to real life, she thinks, where being out of shape will get you killed. Thankfully, her brain supplies the keycode instantly. That same treacherous brain points out that this is because she's not being watched by the Spectres.

Sabine expects some light mockery, deservedly so; she probably looks as if the run has completely destroyed her. Instead there is no-one. The _Ghost_ is locked up, though her code still gets her inside.

But why is she disappointed now? Hadn't the entire objective of the last two hours been to get away from everyone? It's because they could have mentioned they were going out, but didn't, she thinks. If she cared, she'd probably be offended. She all but crawls inside on unstable legs, intent on locating a glass of water, a meal bar, and the refresher, in that order.

What she sees in the common room unsettles her slightly. On the table is a bottle that proclaims to contain _Meiloorun Iced Tea – Best Outer Rim Tasty Refreshing Fruit Beverage_ , drops of condensation beading on its cool exterior, and a glowing datapad with the words:

_Sabine,_

_We hope you had a good run! Now, put down that protein bar and join us when you're ready, we're having dinner at the Loth Star Canteen. Best fried dumplings in downtown Capital City, according to Zeb. It's just off High Street - ask the locals!_

_xxx_

_Hera_

_PS: Sorry for exploding your comlink. We did eventually figure out you'd left it here._

Maybe it's the exhaustion from her run. Or, more likely, maybe it's the whole last month of pain, and regret, and mourning the first and best friendship she'd ever had. Who knows _where_ it comes from, but a wave of conflicting emotions overcomes Sabine. She just stands there.

They're so _nice_! It would be so easy to just go along with this, to fade out all the conflict she already senses. Be part of this group, where they have group dinners at the local pub and leave each other bottles of iced tea (it kills her that someone actually went out and bought it for her, just because they thought she might like it after her run). This thing they have feels more like a family every day. Up to and including the thing with the comlink – she knows she should have probably taken it with her, but did Hera have to point it out like this?

So why don't they trust her? Why can't she be truly, fully, a part of this?

On the other hand: Why would she? She's known them for a month, most of which she'd spent hiding in their spare cabin. To trust her, they'd have to read her mind.

She's so, so tempted to go. But she needs to be careful this time if she wants to avoid another disaster of Ketsu-like proportions. Sabine knows what she wants things to be, but she's not anywhere close to figuring out what's actually going on – with this group, and with herself. She'll need a lot more peace and quiet on her own.

Composing her reply takes a full twenty minutes, while her stomach grumbles and her sweat dries, leaving behind salty crusts on her face and arms.

_Hera,_

_Thanks for the invite! I'm pretty beat, though, will have to call an early night. Next time, OK?_

– _Sabine_

All right, so it's not a masterpiece of eloquence and she probably comes across as a bit of a spoilsport. But maybe they'll be relieved, she thinks, as she sends off the message to Hera's comlink. They are such a close team already, why would they even want her there?

She grabs a meal bar, chows down on it while draining the Meiloorun Tasty Refreshing Fruit Beverage, and then hops into the refresher to bang her head against the wall for a bit.

When she comes out, the comlink blinks. She's going to ignore it, she's going to –

_Kanan says to tell you he'll buy you a Jogan foam cider when you get here, apparently it's a "fun fair in a glass". No, I don't know what he means, or why a grown man would drink anything so alarmingly purple. –Hera_

She has barely finished reading it when the next message comes in with a beep.

_Nevermind. I tasted it. He's right. –Hera_

Sabine sighs inwardly. It does sound like they're having fun.

Beep. _Of course I am right. –Kanan_

That does it. _All right, all right_ , _I'm coming_ , she writes back, and the answer hardly takes a second.

It merely says, _Hooray!_


	2. Chapter 2

As it turns out, there hasn't been a dump in the history of the galaxy dumpy enough that one wouldn't somehow end up in the one pub enforcing the Empire's underage drinking ban. And on Lothal, that would be the Loth Star Canteen, where Kanan says he knows the owner, and the owner says he knows all the patrons, and the patrons would probably say to hell with the Empire. Still no Jogan foam cider for Sabine.

Granted, it's probably a good thing she's not drinking, because one of the problems with Ketsu has, in fact, been the drinking, labelled as _work hard, party harder_. Now that muscle fatigue has settled in, Sabine already has to concentrate if she wants to walk in a straight line. She doesn't need to embarrass herself in front of these people any further.

And it's almost more fun just watching. Hera has been nursing the same half pint of stout ever since Sabine got here. Zeb has been working his way steadily through the beer menu, showing not even the slightest sign of inebriation, which makes Sabine wonder if Lasats are maybe just biologically unaffected by alcohol. And Kanan…

Drinking-wise, Kanan has been the greatest surprise of all. He has long-since moved on from his purple Jogan foam cider and is now pondering a bright green concoction smelling of cough drops. Like Zeb, he appears extremely sober.

Meaning?

She notices Hera watching her watching Kanan, so she shrugs and looks away. Fortunately, Zeb is still in the middle of his story.

"So basically," says Zeb at this moment, "here I am, about to close a deal with a bunch of Zigurian smugglers to buy a bunch of farming equipment for our friends, all perfectly legal for a change, when, wouldn't you know it, in storms a regiment of Stormtroopers and starts scanning IDs! And the Zigurians said to me, well Mr Orrelios, would you like to buy this set of fake IDs, best last chance special discount, six thousand credits, offer valid for the next two minutes."

"Are they blind?" says Kanan.

"Exactly," says Zeb. "So I told him, no point in that, I tend to pop out in a crowd no matter what my ID says, so let me just defuse the situation my own way." With that, he takes a long sip of his Corellian ale.

"Well? What happened then?" says Sabine.

"Oh, you know, not much," says Zeb, apparently a bit surprised at being addressed.

"We don't let Zeb finish his stories anymore," says Hera with a smile.

"Yeah," says Kanan, "because they all tend to end the same way. With Zeb buggering off into the sunset, leaving behind a trail of very embarrassed Stormtroopers."

The table roars with laughter, and Sabine can't help but join in. It seems like the perfect opportunity to finally clear up a thing or two she's been wondering about.

"So are you guys actually working against the Empire?" asks Sabine. "Or are the embarrassed Stormtroopers just a side effect?"

There's a sudden silence at the table.

"What?" says Sabine. "You've been very subtle about this. A simple yes or no would suffice." She thinks for a moment. "I don't mind if you do," she adds, just in case that is the problem.

Kanan takes a dramatically exaggerated look around – no point, if there'd been any Imperial agents, Zeb's story would already have set them off, and in any case, the tables are fitted with sound scramblers.

Hera says, rather more seriously, "We are operating _outside_ the Empire, to the benefit of people who have been put at a disadvantage _by_ the Empire."

"Sometimes the Empire takes offense," says Kanan innocently. "That good enough for you?"

"But is that on purpose?" says Sabine. "Or just a happy accident? Or in other words, are you working to bring them down, or just okay with pissing them off?"

Chopper rattles off something.

"He's right," says Zeb. "It's not the sort of thing you just broadcast."

"Zeb!" says Hera sharply.

"In front of a room full of strangers," adds Zeb. "Is what I meant."

"You want to know whether we are associated with the rebellion," says Kanan.

"At least someone's asking the important questions," says Hera drily.

Hera and Kanan look at each other, and Sabine gets the brief but intense impression that this is already a much-discussed issue, before Hera says, quietly, "We've exchanged information with the rebellion. And we share a common belief with them that the galaxy would be better off without the Empire."

But the Empire's been around since basically forever. Sabine can't even imagine how the galaxy would be without its dark looming presence. She nods, slouches back into her chair, feeling as if she's invited Darth Vader himself to the table.

"How about you, Sabine?" asks Hera. "Where would you like this thing to go?"

Sabine swallows, not quite ready to give her opinion, not before she's found out so much more. "I don't think it's my decision, is it?" she says. "I mean, it looks like whatever you're doing is working out for you guys."

"Let's say you're working with us," says Kanan earnestly. "Everyone who's working with us gets a say –"

"– As long as they're presenting a well-reasoned argument –," Hera points out.

"– As long as they're presenting a well-reasoned argument," says Kanan. "That. If you were working with us, where would you want this to go?"

_Oh, take a leap of faith, Wren_ , she thinks. "The Empire is behind every bad thing that has ever happened in my life," she says, looking down on the table. "I don't even know what my life would look like without it. I guess I was hoping to _hear_ a well-reasoned argument. Where to go from here. With the Empire gone, how would I even know who I am?"

Zeb places his glass on the table with some gravitas. "'Fraid you'll have to find that out yourself," he says.

"Yeah, right," says Sabine. "Look at me, I can't even get a drink, how can I figure out my life? But." Well, better now than never. "The next operation. Can I help?"

Kanan is smiling, and despite herself, it feels Sabine with a glowing warmth. "We thought you'd never ask," he says.

* * *

In her dreams, Sabine is adrift again. It's not flying anymore, nor is it falling, just aimless floating, punctuated by sudden twists and jerks. The temperature keeps dropping, and in time, even the terrors abate.

If she has to die, let her die in space.

Yet here she is, she thinks, alive, or some approximation thereof, staring up at the ceiling. It's a long night on Lothal.

But even this one ends, and the Spectres are up and about way earlier than Sabine would have expected. There's a cheerful knock on her door –

"I'm awake," she calls out –

– and a second later, the smell of hot coffee.

"You realise that Hera is going to kill you," says Kanan in lieu of a greeting.

"It's not permanent," says Sabine, putting the finishing swirls on the bottom of the circular design. "Pretty sure. Unless the _Ghost's_ walls contain Hfredium, which might bond with the cadmium oxide in the paint. I've got to admit I didn't check that."

"So, in other words, if you ever spray-painted a Star Destroyer, it wouldn't come off?" says Kanan. "Let me just file away that information for future use. What's that thing in there, a duck? A very round one?"

"It's a phoenix," says Sabine from her position on the floor from where she's been admiring her handiwork.

Kanan squints. "Huh, so it is," he says. "Do I get points for noticing it was a bird?"

"How are you not still in a coma?" says Sabine, slightly offended. "You drank your way through the entire rainbow last night!"

Okay, so that is not entirely fair, because, after the purple drink, the green drink, and the magenta drink, Kanan's fourth drink last night had been a three-layered Sunrise Over Lothal in yellow, red, and indigo. (Sabine had thought at least one of them should keep a tally.)

Kanan shrugs. "Coffee," he says. "That reminds me, I brought you some. Up and at it, we have an operation to plan." He looks pretty chipper about the prospect.

So they remembered they'd invited her! Sabine jumps up excitedly. Then: "Ow!"

"Sore?" he asks with some amusement.

"You wish, old man," she answers through clenched teeth. By pure willpower, she makes her body move slightly more fluidly than the average protocol droid as she strides past him towards the lobby, snatching the offered coffee out of his hand as she does so.

"So, what's the objective?" she asks on the way. "Liberating a bunch of tractors from an Imperial trial farm? Or installing air filters in the durasteel factory?"

"We are rescuing a group of prisoners before they're transferred off-world," says Kanan.

"Oh," says Sabine. "Okay. Sounds worthwhile. What are they imprisoned for?"

"Politics, I assume," says Kanan. "Our contact hasn't really elaborated on that. These off-world transports are generally just a way to get prisoners away from any local legislature that might protect them, and that's never a good sign. Anyway, that's why we need you."

Sabine swallows hard. "What for?" she asks. Her deep insight into Stormtrooper tactics? Her ability to operate an AT-ST or short-circuit a speeder bike if need be? Did he even _know_ about any of this?

"We're gonna ambush a heavily armed Imperial transport," says Kanan. "Obviously we'll need fireworks. Try and keep up."

* * *

Later that day, they've taken the _Phantom_ to a remote part of the plains surrounding Capital City. Sabine has dismantled a handful of their spare photon torpedoes and improved them with the contents of a brown paper bag she'd obtained at the local chemist's. Now everyone's standing back to watch as she remotely sets off the first one.

" _Nice_ ," says Hera. "Exactly what we need. The Empire will have kittens over this."

Next to her, Kanan looks more sceptical as he scratches his beard. "Almost what we need," he said. "Don't you think?"

"I _wanted_ to make them more colourful," says Sabine. "I have all the stuff here, give me half an hour."

"The colour is fine," says Kanan. "It's supposed to look like a photon torpedo attack. But what this operation really needs is some glitter."

" _Glitter_ ," says Sabine. "Not personally opposed to glitter, but. _Why_?"

"Kanan's right," says Hera, after some consideration. "This needs glitter. Or a musical effect."

Even Chopper contributes his opinion.

"Yeah," says Zeb. "Or maybe just a smell that makes everyone want to go far away." Apparently, he, too, is in on the secret.

"If anything, I get it even less now," says Sabine, as the last of the sparkles diffuse in the dusty air.

"We're exploding them on High Street," says Hera. "In the middle of a crowd."

"But they're not dangerous," says Sabine. "I've even made them quieter by four orders of magnitude. A speeder bike would be louder than that."

"But they're still very loud and, importantly, they still look like photon torpedo explosions," says Kanan patiently. "The last thing we want is to cause a big panic. Or – " he looks over the remaining torpedoes , " – six individual panics. That will get people hurt."

"So what we want is something that looks really dangerous from afar and really silly from up close, is that what you're telling me?" says Sabine.

It does make a lot of sense. Sabine is just not used to thinking about explosions from the point of view of someone who might be scared of explosions. But then, she's not as bad as Ketsu, who would have just rolled her eyes at their concern.

"Like Darth Vader?" says Zeb.

"I don't even know what he looks like from up close," says Kanan. "I make a point of starting to run in the other direction as soon as he's in the same quadrant."

"Do _you_ know what Darth Vader looks like from up close, Zeb?" asks Sabine.

"No, I employ much the same sophisticated strategy as Kanan," says Zeb. "But the thought keeps me happy. I like to imagine him with jug ears and spinach stuck to his teeth."

"Can we please concentrate on what's important right now," says Hera. " _Glitter_. Sabine, any ideas on what we could use?"

"I don't suppose the Phantom has any particle-based tractor beam confounders?" say Sabine. "They are designed to scatter light. It would be beautiful."

"Nah," says Zeb. "Could we melt some of the sand with the blasters? Make glass particles?"

"That would actually make the fireworks _more_ dangerous," Sabine points out.

"Oh, yeah."

"I could probably get some glitter when we're back in the city," says Sabine, "but we wouldn't have time to test the diversion again."

"Not good," says Kanan. "Hera?"

"Well you know me," says Hera. "I have a thing about detonating anything in the middle of a crowd without knowing what it does. Sabine, how certain are you that these things will work exactly as predicted?"

Sabine hesitates. But if she ever wants these guys to take her seriously, she needs to be honest.

Even if it comes across as bragging. So here goes. "A hundred per cent," she says.

"Really now?"

"What? I _said_ I'm a weapons expert," says Sabine. "Normally, I would run comprehensive tests of any addition to an existing system before I use it, but we are talking about _glitter_. I can predict the mean glitter density at any point within a half-kilometre sphere around the origin, down to ten particles per cubic metre, is that good enough? Or, in other words, _do you trust me_?"

That last question, she realises belatedly, really just kind of came out with the rest, probably because the question has become so entangled with her thoughts over the last month.

It probably had to be asked at some point, just maybe not now.

Unfortunately, the reaction is not the uniform "Yes!" she would have liked. Zeb scratches his head. Chopper rasps off something incomprehensive. Kanan, as he often does, looks over at Hera.

"I said the fireworks were good, and that was the tricky part, wasn't it?" says Hera. "I vote yes and we go over to the next part of the agenda."

"Which was what?" asks Zeb.

"After we have set off the fireworks, we will have to get past a bunch of Imperial tanks," says Hera in a conversational tone.

"Yeah," says Kanan. "That."

* * *

The operation doesn't go as planned. Of course not. But that's got nothing to do with the fireworks, which go off beautifully. Chopper is their contact on the ground, and the video he transmits over the comlink are rather uplifting: the sparklers go off with a bit of a bang, then, when they're three metres above the ground, the glitterbomb pops, sending millions of pink, heart-shaped reflective particles flying.

Some pedestrians are laughing. Some are grumbling. Little kids are trying to catch the glitter hearts in their fists. Grown men are trying and failing to get it out of their hair and clothes. A black-haired teen is using the confusion to steal a bag of Jogan fruits. But importantly, no-one is panicking.

Except for the Imperials.

Sabine and Kanan are, for the moment, lying low on a flat rooftop belonging to a one-storey building, beneath the large air conditioning units on top. Down below on the market square, the Imperial convoy has been crawling along through the busy market, but now it stops dead.

They've planned this meticulously. The typical response time for a diversion this big should be about twelve minutes. Most of the Imperial troops are still amassed at the garrison, but it's too far away to deal with this efficiently. Six concurrent explosions in the middle of the city should therefore draw at least some troops from the convoy.

Kanan is on his stomach, watching the convoy through macrobinoculars. Meanwhile, Sabine is keeping an eye on the only way up to the roof, in case any Imperials get the idea to check out this perfect observation point.

"Something's odd," Kanan says over their comlink channel. "Spectre One to Spectre Four, any idea?"

"Looks fine to me," Zeb's voice rasps through the channel. He is positioned on a rooftop opposite them. "They're reacting a bit slow today, aren't they?"

"As soon as the tanks have left the square, Spectre Five and I are going down," says Kanan. "Timing is key. They won't need long to figure out it's a diversion, so we'll need to be out of here when they return."

"Copy that, Spectre One," says Zeb. "I've got your back."

"Spectre One to Spectre Two," says Kanan. "All clear?"

"Spectre Two here. I'm in position," says Hera over the comlink. "Pickup in fifteen, holler if you get in trouble. What did you mean, something's odd?"

"Just a feeling," says Kanan.

"I hate it when you say that, Spectre One" says Hera. "Estimated T0 is in seven minutes, so get to the bottom of it."

"It's the BT-7 tanks," says Kanan after a moment. "In a standard operation, they would be at the rear of the convoy, but they are not. And they look weird. Is there an upgrade we missed?"

Sabine looks up.

"Nevermind, they're clearing the square," says Kanan. "Earlier than expected. Timing update: two and a half minutes to T0. Spectre Four, looks like I'm going down on the East side of the building. Spectre Five is going down North. Spectre Five, you can stop watching that door now and get in position."

Sabine has, in fact, stopped watching that door. Instead, she has her helmet's built-in macros fixed on the Imperial convoy, specifically on the tanks, trying to make out what on earth has tripped Kanan's suspicions. Whatever it is, it must be really subtle.

"Copy that, Spectre One," says Zeb. "Good luck, Spectres."

"Get ready to jump, Spectre Five," says Kanan. "You're not in position yet." If he's impatient with the crew's youngest member, however, he's not showing it. Yet.

"One minute, Spectre One," says Sabine, trying to lay maximum urgency and minimum panic into her voice. "I need to see that upgrade you mentioned."

"Cutting it really close, Spectre Five" says Kanan. "Hurry."

Sabine looks so hard she fears she might get cross-eyed. The BT-7 tanks do look only slightly off. That is, until one of them turns into the light of the setting sun and she can make out the characteristic shape of the radio receiver at the rear.

"Ready in forty-five seconds," says Kanan.

"A BT-7 AX," says Sabine. "I've never even seen one of them outside of blueprints. Certainly wouldn't have expected them on Lothal."

"How substantial is that upgrade, Spectre Five?" says Hera over the comlink.

"It's probably fine," says Sabine. "Most of these upgrades are cosmetic."

Artillery manufacturers want to make money, too. It's not an entirely appropriate moment to be wracking her brain about what makes the BT-7 AX superior over the standard BT-7.

"Ready?" says Kanan.

But what does irritate her is _how_ expensive she remembers these babies to be. Certainly not even the Empire would be shelling out this kind of money for nothing. Right?

_There's a task at hand, Wren!_ "Ready," replies Sabine, despite herself.

It's probably good that she's still a bit sore from her run two days ago. She makes off to the Northern edge, a split second slower than she would normally be, and then it hits her.

Trouble.

They're in big, big trouble.

She turns, and she sees Kanan already running towards the Eastern edge. For a tiny moment, Sabine can just stare. That man can run!

"STOP," she shouts, but already she understands that the laws of physics will not allow Kanan to stop in time. The rest is instinct. The quickest way to stop Kanan before he jumps into the crowd is, unfortunately, to bullet into him at a full run as he passes her. So she does just that. It'll take considerable force, considering he has about sixty pounds on her, and that means considerable speed for her –

She'll be sore for _weeks_ after this, she thinks numbly –

– But she makes it, and they collide into a bit of a heap right at the edge of the roof.

Heaven only knows what that sounded like over the comlink, because the reaction is prompt.

"Spectre Two to Spectre One," says Hera. "What the hell happened there?"

"Spectre One here," mumbles Kanan, when he catches his breath. "I'm not entirely sure."

Air knocked out of her, Sabine tries to speak, but the first attempt goes nowhere. The second is more successful.

"Spectre Five here," she says. "Code two. Code six. … Code one. … Right?" Kanan looks down on her with some confusion, then raises his own comlink. "Spectre One here. Code one confirmed."

Well, he's allowed to be a bit surprised. _Code two_ means 'pickup cancelled'. _Code six_ means 'cease all transmissions, we are being intercepted'. And considering what they had been transmitting so for, _Code one_ had just sounded like a good idea to Sabine.

_Code one_ means 'abort mission'.

The message is answered only by three clicks, as Hera, Zeb, and Chopper switch off their comlinks.

Sabine's head sinks. "Oof," she says. "You're heavy."

"Apologies," says Kanan drily, extricating himself from the heap. He reaches around with gloved hands until he has collected a long metal cylinder that has gone flying in the collision. "Explain yourself?"

He doesn't seem angry. Instead, he has picked up the macros again, scans the crowd for anything unusual that Sabine might have picked up. Meanwhile the optimal timepoint to ambush is passing in front of their eyes.

"That BT-7 AX," starts Sabine, trying to clear her mind from what she has just witnessed. She'll have to think about that metal cylinder later. Much later. Maybe never.

"I remembered," she says. "It's not a mere upgrade. It's a mobile battle station, developed for the Imperial Guard. The on-board system supports real-time code decryption and source localisation, and the battle coordination software can handle enhanced crowd control and," she catches her breath, "coordination of air support."

" _Air support_?" says Kanan. "No-one said anything about air support! This is a dead-end Imperial garrison on a backwater planet, not a high-level security facility. They're not exactly sending their best and brightest here."

"As I said," says Sabine. "I think they upgraded. They must have plans for Lothal."

She stares up into the cloudless blue sky. "And here they are," she says softly, as TIE fighters come roaring out of nowhere.

Fortunately, they are still under cover of the gigantic air conditioning units. Kanan is back to lying on his stomach, scanning the market place.

"And there we see the enhanced crowd control, I think," he says. "Good call, Sabine."

Sabine can see he's right. Within minutes, the square has been almost cleared from civilians. TIEs are roaring overhead, and a cordon of Stormtroopers is tightening around the convoy in the middle, which is exactly where they would be right now. Totally exposed.

Trapped.

"Think they had time to track the signal to our location?" says Kanan.

"We're using a pretty good signal scattering algorithm," says Sabine, "but unfortunately, they're using a pretty good signal refocusing algorithm. On the whole, I wouldn't count on them not to."

"Okay, good," says Kanan. "I was feeling like running away."


	3. Chapter 3

The mood isn't great when the Spectres eventually regroup at the _Ghost_ 's landing pit. But since they all managed to walk away from the aborted mission without attracting any more Imperial attention, it isn't terrible, either. Over an improvised dinner of meal bars and Jogan-flavoured tea, the others are already joking about how at least the glitterbombs hadn't been a complete waste. Because the locals had looked like they needed cheering up, right?

Sabine is a bit wary. At this point, Ketsu would have already found twelve different ways to shift the blame for this mess away from herself, and would start plotting for elaborate revenge right about now. She certainly wouldn't have sat down to dinner like a normal person.

After dinner, Hera and Kanan hole up in the lobby, poring over datapads and charts and local maps and a growing flock of empty coffee cups. Planning the next op? They are talking in low voices, wearing their serious expressions, so everyone else tries to stay out of their way.

Zeb catches some holonet programme in his room. Chopper, too, connects to the holonet, taking advantage of a rare quiet evening to update his databases with everything he finds useful, from starship blueprints to bad jokes.

All of this is so completely normal. _Routine_. It's disquieting to Sabine, who has snuck up to hide on top of the _Ghost_ with vague plans to stare miserably into the sunset for a while.

That has been a couple of hours ago, and the sunset is in full blast now. The sounds from Zeb's programme – laser shots, canned laughter – have stopped, and now all she can her is muffled voices from the ship below, air traffic from the sky above. But even the traffic over Lothal spaceport has thinned down. All that's left for tonight is departures – planetary ferries and large interstellar passenger skiffs that circle airspace in a complex loop pattern before vanishing into the indigo sky.

It's hard to imagine being on board one of these, strapped into a seat in aisle row, no view of the stars, just her and eight hundred smelly strangers. She supposes she'll have to get used to the thought before long.

There's a knock. There's no door, but there's a knock. What strange people she has acquired!

Sabine looks up and of course it's Kanan. Well, she's been expecting this. She'd just hoped that maybe he'd give her one more day before sending her packing.

"Sabine," says Kanan. "I think we need to talk."

"Says who?"

"Says I. And Hera," says Kanan. "And Zeb. And Chop. They sent me up because they say I'm the most persuasive."

"I can take the next passenger flight off Lothal," says Sabine. "It's okay." She'll miss the Spectres, but it's okay. She's been lonely before. Even she can see there's no going back now.

Kanan fixes her with a very strange sort of glare, then settles down next to her. "Now, whatever gave you that idea?" he asks.

As if he doesn't know.

The mental script Sabine has been working in the past two hours has not prepared her for outright denial. She pauses, before asking, "That isn't why you came up here?"

"Sabine," says Kanan. "You saved us from a lot of trouble today."

"I suppose – you're welcome?" she says carefully.

"Don't let it get to your head, kid. I could have done without the bruises," he says, before clearing his voice. "We want to invite you to be part of the crew."

"Hm," she says. _So maybe he hasn't noticed I noticed_? she ponders. That should solve all her problems in the present, but, admittedly, has the potential to explode on her in the future.

"Really?" she says carefully.

"Yes," he says. "But –"

"That's more like it," says Sabine.

"We should get clear on a few issues," says Kanan. "Make sure we can all trust each other. This team depends on each other in all sorts of serious situations, and we all need to know what we are getting into, okay?" He leans back on his hands. "Think of it as a job interview. Only without the lying." He grins.

"Okay," says Sabine. "I also have a couple things that need, you know. Clearing up."

Kanan shrugs. "That's just to be expected." Is it just her, or is he employing his Sabacc face again?

"Well then," says Sabine. "Ask away."

"Okay," says Kanan. "Probably the most important question. Are you comfortable being part of this?"

He, for one, looks very comfortable being part of this, she thinks. Lounging back, his long legs are dangling over the edge of the deck. Sabine herself feels tenser than ever. _Don't mess this one up, too, Wren_.

"Why are you asking?"

"Well, you do seem to spend an awful lot of your time on your own," Kanan points out. "And that's okay if that's your style. But if there's anything, or anyone, you're avoiding, then obviously that's not good –"

"Nothing in particular, no," says Sabine. He's really asking the difficult questions first, isn't he?

"Then what is it?"

"Look," says Sabine. "I really just prefer keeping my distance, okay? I told you, I was working with my best friend and it didn't work out."

"Were you?" asks Kanan, and he _sounds_ innocent, but Sabine knows exactly where he is planning to go with that, and he does. "And where was your friend when we found you drifting in space over Corellia?"

She has never really talked about that part, and now she wonders how the _Ghost_ crew has just taken this in stride.

"She completed the mission, okay?" says Sabine. "Someone had to, and I wasn't going anywhere."

She hesitates before continuing, but really, where's the harm? "Ketsu knew my fighter had a critical hit," she says. "She saw everything."

It isn't until she is saying this out loud that Sabine realises how bitter she is, how disappointed. How devastated that this is how the best friendship she ever had ended. Before now, she has tried not believing this herself. Has tried convincing herself Ketsu made a mistake, or hadn't known. Anything but this.

There is some silence after this.

"And you think you can protect yourself against betrayal by not making friends?" says Kanan.

Sabine can't believe he's saying that. "You can't protect yourself against betrayal," she says.

"No," says Kanan. Does it sound like he knows from experience? "But you can pick better friends and hope for the best," he adds.

Well, that just sounds dismissive.

"Betrayal hurts more when you're friends," says Sabine. "I'm tired of hurting."

Kanan has a very odd expression on his face, but then he shakes his head and it's gone. "That's not how we operate," he says. "When you're part of the team, we're not leaving you behind. Do you believe me?"

"What if there's a greater good?" she asks.

"This _is_ the greater good," says Kanan. "It's the beauty of an independent operation – no-one to answer to but us. Sounds okay?"

And maybe the reason they're not part of the rebellion? Sabine wonders.

"Sounds a bit unrealistic," she says. "But I like the attitude behind it."

Kanan nods, possibly in understanding of the point she is trying to make. "Anyway," he says. "No pressure to decide right away. We're not leaving Lothal until next week, the repulsors need fixing. So get a couple runs in, think about all this. The pay isn't great, you know, and sometimes it's Zeb's turn to cook. Just so you're warned."

Frankly, it sounds like the complete opposite of what Sabine, up until last month, has thought was her masterplan for her future, so she ponders that for a bit.

"Is that it?" Sabine asks finally. "Because if it is, I still have a couple of –"

"When you say you're a weapons expert," Kanan interrupts her casually, incidentally inching closer to what she was going to address, "where exactly did you –"

"The Imperial Academy of Mandalore," says Sabine. She's been expecting this for a while. "I was in the fast track programme, three and a half years. I developed a lot of really –" she hesitates – " _effective_ stuff. I know my shit. Way beyond the physics of glitter."

"Yeah, we noticed you're pretty good," says Kanan off-handedly. "Three and a half years at an Imperial Academy, huh?"

There is silence.

"I believed in the Empire," she says eventually. "I don't anymore."

"What made you believe in them?"

"Okay, Kanan, this is the most nerve-racking job interview _ever_ ," says Sabine. "How about we were kids and they told us a bunch of lies. About how we were the _elite_ , how everyone else was inferior. About how the Empire only could restore stability and grandeur to Mandalore. They lied and lied, and _we ate that shit up_. Mandalore had just come out of a decade-long civil war, remember?"

"Okay then, sounds pretty inescapable," says Kanan. "What made you stop believing?"

Sabine hesitates. But does not want to touch this, not even if it costs her the greatest opportunity of her life. There's so much pain and guilt wrapped up with this, she doesn't know if she's ever going to face it willingly again.

"I don't want to talk about this," she says.

"Don't you think it's important?" says Kanan.

" _Important_?" The worst thing about this, Sabine thinks, is that she knows exactly how Kanan is doing this, and yet she's going along with it anyway. Because yes, it's important. In some ways, she even agrees that the Spectres probably need to know the answer before taking her in. Still, this is _infuriating_.

"I designed weapons. What do you _think_ happened?" She realises she sounds more aggressive than she meant to. Again.

Maybe she is just really, really bad at talking to this man in particular.

"It's _okay_ , Sabine," says Kanan. "The Empire rarely brings out the best in anyone. And you were a kid. You _are_ a kid."

" _Don't_ patronise me," she says. "I designed weapons for the Empire. What did you do at fourteen, take your parents' landglider for a joyride?"

His expression is unreadable, so she guesses it was probably the wrong thing to say.

Which, in a way, is evidence.

"It's not a competition," he says after a moment. "We all bring different histories. The important thing is that we can trust each other now."

"Yeah, about that," says Sabine numbly. "Was there anything else, or – ?"

"Actually, there was," says Kanan, scratching his head, but somehow still giving the impression he's glad to change the topic.

"Hera told me to bring it up," he says, "but I suppose if she wants this talked about, she can come to you herself. Anyway, I'm not seeing it."

Baited thusly, of course Sabine can't resist. "What is it?" she says, before her brain can stop her mouth. Hera is extremely perceptive. Kanan, right now, is extremely, almost comically, uncomfortable. These two facts together can only mean one thing –

Oh _shit_.

She'd better go packing.

"Well, Hera said," begins Kanan. "Well, she said that she might be wrong, and between us, she probably is, but she got the impression that you, ah, might have taken what she called, quote unquote, a _shine_ , and yes, that's her words, on a member of the crew, who appears to be, well, me. And she told _me_ to go handle it like an adult."

He scratches his head. "So here I am," he says. "I brought it up. She's wrong. Let's now all go our merry ways, shall we? We're playing Sabacc downstairs, want to come?"

Throughout this, Sabine has thought it tactically wise to remain extremely silent. One side glance reveals that this is the wrong tactic.

"Oh god," says Kanan. "Really?"

Sabine groans. "It's _complicated_ ," she says. And it is, especially after today. "I'll just take that passenger skiff off Lothal, shall I."

Kanan clears his throat. "There's no need for that," he says.

"I would think the mutual ear-burning embarrassment would be reason enough to leave the planet," says Sabine. "Right about now sounds good."

"No," says Kanan. "Not because of that. I'm sorry, I shouldn't have been so flippant when I brought this up." He perks up a bit. "You know, when _I_ was sixteen –"

"Oh _god_. Don't."

He laughs. "You can walk away any time, but I truly think you need to hear this story," he says.

"Are you going to tell me about that one time you wrote a love letter to your teacher?" says Sabine. "Because that's the one thing that will make this situation so much _more_ awkward."

"So I was sharing an apartment with a woman on some tiny little moon in the back of beyond," Kanan continues without acknowledging her concerns. "We were both working for the same mining company. Merrywater, Inc. She was about forty, drop-dead gorgeous, a foot taller than me, could run for miles carrying a hundredweight of ore on her back. Of course I had the galaxy's biggest and most embarrassing crush on her. Only I didn't think of it as such. I was _in love_."

"I said it was _complicated_ ," says Sabine through clenched teeth.

"Just go along with the story," says Kanan. "I promise, it's hilarious. At least, it is now."

She notices he is staring wistfully into the sunset. "So here's sixteen-year-old Kanan Jarrus," he continues, "scrawny git, usually covered in soot, usually collapsed on the couch after each shift. Over there is _Yulinda_ , the amazon of Merrywater, Inc., drinks me under the table without breaking a sweat, brings home a different person or three every weekend, and I was happily resigned to the delusion that she was going to run out of alternatives eventually. So I flirted. Subtly."

He scratches his head in reminiscence. "Or what went for subtle in a household like this," he adds. "You usually had to work past at least three layers of hangover on both sides of the conversation."

Despite herself, Sabine is intrigued. "What happened?"

"When she could no longer gracefully ignore my advances – and Yulinda had very little patience in the first place," he says, "she sat me down and told me, in so many words, _Go hit on someone your own age, you little tit_. I can still hear it in my head, clear as day. It was quite traumatising."

"And?"

"And she commenced to open a bottle of cider with her teeth and watch her cheesy holonet program. _Life, Love, and Etiquette at the Royal Court of Naboo_ , I think it was called."

"I meant you!"

"Me?" says Kanan. "Oh, it was the most helpful romantic advice I received in my formative years, and naturally, I was _crushed_. I was so crushed I left the planet! Bit of an overreaction, don't you think? And just a shame in general, I could have learned so much more, just watching from the sidelines."

He shakes his head. "I don't know where I was going with this. Okay, that's a lie. The message is pretty sound, even if Yulinda's delivery was lacking. I suggest you take it to heart."

"Really," says Sabine incredulously. "That's your message. _Go hit on someone your own age, you little_ _t_ –"

"You're right," interrupts Kanan, and then, after some deliberation, "it probably needs some expanding. And she needn't have called me little, I was still waiting for my growth spurt."

He seems to draw himself together, and it is unclear whether this is an act or whether this is him ending an act. In any case, the shift is quite impressive.

"Sabine," he says, "to choose some different words, obviously I'm flattered, and _obviously_ I am going to respectfully decline."

_Oh god_ , she thinks, for the umpteenth time in this conversation. This is him letting her down gently. Being _nice_ about it.

"Oh god," she says thusly. "I've reconsidered. I'm fine with the original message. The less said about this, the better."

"No, Sabine," says Kanan with a sigh. "Let's talk about emotions."

"Are you _trying_ to be a git so I'll hate you? Because it's working. Case closed."

At this point, Sabine is almost laughing with the absurdity of it, and Kanan is, too. "No, I'm trying to make an important point," he says. "Just you wait for it. Because I don't think pretending emotions don't exist is going to get anyone anywhere, _especially_ since we're going to be a team."

"No, seriously, will you _shut up_."

"Emotions are very important, Sabine," he says patiently.

"Well, you're obviously not going to shut up," Sabine says, with a sigh, "so by all means, carry on, so I can get to my flight in time."

She feels a bit defeated, but also oddly intrigued. Exactly what does Kanan Jarrus have to say about the topic? It _almost_ beats missing the chance to take this to her grave.

"There is no point in repressing emotions," says Kanan after a long pause. "Trust me, they turn… _weird_ … under pressure. Instead, use them for what they are: A source of information. They tell you something about yourself. If you don't like what they're telling you about yourself, you can work on that. You can evolve."

Another pause.

"Sometimes, that means just growing up," he adds.

"So what does this tell me about myself?" says Sabine in a low voice. "What, except, hey, teenage girl falls for the tall, dark hero who saved her from a drifting ship? That just says _teenage girl_. It's not terribly informative."

"…Tall, dark hero?"

Looking up, she sees that Kanan is wearing his _Oh, come on now_ expression.

"Seriously," says Sabine "You're about eight feet tall and you shoot like the devil himself. If you had a leather jacket, you wouldn't be able to _see_ for swooning girls. What's not to admire?"

"Oh, Hera could give you a list," says Kanan, grinning.

"It's ridiculous. Worse, it's _trite_. I thought I was better than – "

"It tells you that you are human," says Kanan. "And that you are looking for a place where you belong. Most of us do. And for most of us, that means we are looking for the people that complete us, in the literal sense. The people that push us to be the best possible version of ourselves."

"And for you, that's Hera," says Sabine.

"Yes," says Kanan simply. "And I suppose, for you, it was Ketsu. For a while."

"… Yes," Sabine hears herself saying in a very small voice.

"I'm sorry it ended this way," says Kanan.

For a while, they are both just watching the sunset. Lothal has a good sunset, she thinks, it's probably all the pollution from the Imperial durasteel factory, but it does make for a good sunset.

She wonders if the topic is finally finished, when Kanan asks, in a calm voice, "What mission could have been so important that she'd leave you behind?"

"Just a delivery," says Sabine. "Stolen droids. That should have been our entry ticket to Black Sun. She always wanted it more than me. So I guess she did push me to be a better – well, a different version of myself. We _are_ talking about Black Sun, after all."

She blinks, thinking this through for the first time. "So, to answer the question," she begins. "That was what was so important. Thrill, money, fame, and all she had to give up was me. A good deal, right?"

"Not for Ketsu, no. For you, though –" says Kanan. "No, hear me out. Consider who you could have been. Doesn't it make sense now, that you're here instead? Yes, she left you behind, but now you are free to leave _her_ behind. You don't have to rely on just one person anymore. We are offering you four Spectres, and a place, and a _purpose_ , if these are what you are looking for. If you want to be Spectre Five."

He looks at her questioningly.

"I can't answer that yet," Sabine says. "Not until you trust me. You talk about trust so much, but you're not –"

"Not what?" says Kanan.

"Never mind," says Sabine. "I'm not sure if this conversation has not already been uncomfortable enough."

"But you're right," says Kanan. "This thing won't work if we don't feel comfortable asking the questions we need answered. And I believe you said you had a question."

"One, yes," says Sabine. And she still hesitates, because maybe it's best not to know.

But she watches him from the side. Sees Kanan straightening himself. He knows, or guesses, that she knows.

_So out with it, Wren_. "On the roof today," she says, "you dropped a metal cylinder when I careened into you. What is it?"

Kanan does not look surprised, though he is silent for a long while. "There is no going back from this," he says. "Knowing will make your life a fair bit more dangerous."

"You said all this stuff about trust," says Sabine. "So do the work and _trust me now_."

There is silence, and it is not abating and Sabine is frustrated. Just when she thinks she has a handle on Kanan – a common ground, an understanding, even empathy for her past, something that has genuinely made her feel better there for a minute – he falls silent when it could be his turn to open up. Now she just feels dissected.

She realises belatedly that he may have invited this question not because he is ready to let her in on the secret, but just to see how much she has already guessed. How much work it is going to be to cover up.

And if she's being fair, she could almost understand it, because there are chapters in her past that she never again wants so much as think, much less talk about.

But then, nothing about their exchange here feels fair, because all she got out of Kanan was the story of Yulinda, the amazon of Merrywater, Inc. How dares he read her so well, when she's not allowed to know the first thing about his past?

And after she's done thinking all these thoughts, Kanan still manages to surprise her by speaking first.

"You're the weapons expert," he says. "You already know."


	4. Chapter 4

"You're the weapons expert," he says. "You already know."

So that's Kanan's cards laid open, or as open as they get with Kanan. Sabine realises that even now, he is offering her the option of changing the course of the conversation. Pretend she doesn't know. It would make life so much simpler for all of them.

But of course she can't. "I am the weapons expert," she confirms. "Did you think I wouldn't recognise one of the most iconic weapons in the galaxy?"

More deliberate silence, and then, "I was under the impression they'd wiped all public records," says Kanan. "I suppose if you want a job done well, don't leave it to the Imperials." He sounds more than a little bitter. Though not surprised.

"They didn't wipe the records at the Academy archive," says Sabine. "But I never thought I'd see a real one, though. How did you even get it?"

"It's just a keepsake," says Kanan. "A remnant of a different time. There was a time before the Empire, you know."

"A keepsake," says Sabine. "How can a lightsabre be a keepsake? They were destroyed along with the Jedi. And you are far too young – "

It is embarrassing how long her brain has held on to this particular delusion. She really should have learned by now that no-one is ever too young for the misery the universe is dishing out. And since she got this far, she might as well just go all the way now.

She'd somehow believed – hoped – that maybe Kanan had inherited the lightsabre, or stolen it from an Imperial archive, or that he had been given it by a dying Jedi with instructions to look out for its true heir. In short, she'd hoped for a story. But this is a whole other person. A stranger.

In sum, something clicks, and it clicks _hard_.

"Oh my god," she says. "You were a student."

There's a pause, and then, "A padawan," says Kanan.

"You must have been what, fifteen?"

"Fourteen," he says.

"Well, _shit_ ," says Sabine.

Sabine'd been fourteen when she ran from the Academy. She knows from experience it is not a good age to have the ground pulled from under your feet.

Now that it's out, the annoying thing is that she should have guessed something like this even before today, maybe even as early as a month ago. Because how did they even meet? The _Ghost_ fell out of lightspeed with a malfunctioning hyperdrive motivator, navigated its way through Corellian orbit outside standard sublight corridors, and stumbled over Sabine's disabled, drifting, and non-transmitting fighter.

It's so obvious in hindsight. The only way the _Ghost_ crew could have noticed her was by a) already being in the right place, _and_ b) looking out the window at exactly the right millisecond, _and_ c) somehow being able to tell apart her damaged fighter from the rest of the debris. In the dark, on the night side of Corellia. It is a statistical impossibility.

"I'm so sorry, Kanan," she says, and she means it. "I studied the records, they're – I'm sorry."

"Don't be," says Kanan. "You were a little kid then, it's ancient history. Best forgotten."

"Why even bring that thing along, then?"

"It's just a wonderful weapon, best there is," says Kanan. "Having it with me always makes me think of new ways to avoid using it."

"Could you have gotten us out today?" she asks. "With the lightsabre. It was a pretty good trap, but certainly a Jedi –"

"I've seen the Jedi do amazing things," says Kanan. "Maybe. Okay, probably. I'm glad I didn't have to try."

"I'm sorry," she says. "I shouldn't have stopped you. Maybe we could have gotten the prisoners out after all."

"Yeah, about that," he says off-handedly, "that was the _other_ other thing I wanted to talk to you about. Should have probably lead with that, but got a bit side-tracked. Sorry."

With these words, he hands her his macrobinoculars.

Wait. What?

"Hera and I reviewed the recordings I made from the roof today," he says. "There's a tiny detail that should probably have popped out to us at the time, but, as you remember, the Stormtroopers decided to have a party in the middle of our op – see if you can spot it?"

Sabine raises the binoculars to her eyes, turns the knob to fast-forward the recording.

"Concentrate on the prisoner transport after the tanks have finished their defensive manoeuvre," says Kanan. "Who do you see emerging from the transport?"

"More Stormtroopers?" says Sabine, squinting at the tiny screen. "A rather surprising amount, actually."

"Twelve," says Kanan.

"Well, that can't be right," says Sabine. She lowers the macros, blinks into the sunset, then raises them again.

"No," confirms Kanan. "Because that transporter type –"

"– seats twelve," says Sabine. "Eight if they're using enhanced restraints. Where are the prisoners?"

"Nowhere near the market square, that's for sure," says Kanan. He shrugs. "There's nothing you or I could have done differently today. Aborting that operation was the right call."

"Huh," says Sabine. For a moment, she's just sitting there, amazed that they all managed to return in one piece from a mission _that_ impossible.

"Not a great first op for you, sorry," says Kanan. "More luck next time. Are you coming down? We're playing Sabacc."

"In a bit," says Sabine.

Kanan nods, then he unfolds his legs to get up, rights himself on the sloping hull, and turns to leave.

"Kanan," she says after him. "One last question."

He stops, but doesn't say a word.

Sabine hesitates, but the truth is, she really needs to know. "How do you even live after this?" she says.

With Kanan, sometimes there's laughter where she doesn't expect it. "Well, we decided we're not relying on that informant again. That should increase the odds."

"I meant, how do you live after something like Order 66, but if you're going to be like that…" says Sabine. "I'm asking you how, because right now I don't – I don't see how. Tell me."

"It is a long story," says Kanan. "And it'll have to be brief, because yours will be different. It was another time. I was another person. My life sort of evolved away from all that. And I found people who moved it along. Not just Hera, all sorts of people. Some were good people, some… weren't."

"And how does that work?" she says. "If one… evolves… what then? Does the pain go away?"

She hopes Kanan understands what she means by pain, and she has a feeling he does. She means the guilt, the knowledge she's been on the wrong side of history for too long. The betrayal by her friend. Above all, the crushing certainty that history is quickly hurtling down a terrible trajectory and there may be nothing she can do about it. Some of this he shares, some he doesn't, but does it matter? It is always pain.

"The pain you are feeling now," he says, "think of it as a forge for the person you are going to be. And as that person, you will be able to breathe without it choking you. Not now, and maybe not soon, but you will. And it's worth persevering, Sabine."

"And is that for everyone, or just for Jedi?"

At this moment, she acutely realises that this, right now, is a moment she'll remember forever. Kanan standing on the deck of the _Ghost_ , in the last rays of the fading sunset. His face hidden in shadows, but he knows, he _knows_ what she's feeling, and he knows what comes next. And the fact that he's still here to talk to her about this means that it can be fine. Maybe it _will_ be fine. She can't put into words the relief she feels at this thought.

He shrugs. "How would I know?" he says. "I never finished my training."

"You and me both, old man."

He laughs, holds out his hand to her, and to her own surprise, she takes it, even though she is perfectly capable of getting up by herself.

* * *

"Sabine, are you there? Can you hear me? I saw you get hit. Tell me you're okay."

Ketsu's voice through the radio sounds increasingly urgent.

"I'm fine," says Sabine, pressing down the transmit button after an agonising moment of considering the issue from all sides. It's not strictly true, after all.

"The fighter isn't," she continues after a quick look at the console. "Steering and weapons failing, life support on auxiliary. I'm sending out the distress beacon, pick me up sometime soon, okay?"

A pause, and then Ketsu's voice again, "Hey drama queen, can you hear me? Answer me, please!"

With some lingering confusion and a beginning sense of dread, Sabine thumps the sublight radio. It's no good. The transmitter is out: She can receive, but not send. She sets her last message on a loop, just in case the transmitter decides to go online again.

"Okay, Sabine, looks like the pirates are off your back. I bet they think they got you," Ketsu's voice cuts through the static, and as usual, her false bravado sounds remarkably like real bravado. "I spotted an opening and I'm breaking through."

There's nothing to say except, "Hell no!", but Ketsu just keeps on talking.

"– never get a job with them again if we don't deliver. I'll be waiting for you at rendezvous and I'm trusting you to turn up. You hear me? Good lu-"

The silence that follows is the receiver failing as well.

Okay, thinks Sabine, okay. Don't panic now, Wren. Ketsu is gone, but she wasn't being much help anyway. Don't panic.

How?

Time to consider her assets: No weapons, no steering, no communication, and the way things are going, probably no distress beacon, either. Auxiliary power for maybe another two hours. Exactly none of that is good news.

On the plus side: If Ketsu can't spot her in the debris, the pirate fleet that attacked them probably can't either. That means two hours of relative peace and quiet for making the necessary repairs. Oh well, she's had worse.

The really bad news arrive with a bang, and Sabine is pressed hard into the back of her seat. Some high-velocity debris seems to have hit the fighter's nose straight on, but that should have been no problem for the shock absorbers.

Uh-oh.

So those are out, too. Even worse, when she lets her arms sink back from her face – a pointless, time-wasting defensive movement – it becomes clear that the collision has reduced her short list of assets down to nothing.

It's dark and still in the cabin. All lights are off.

" _Shit_ ," she mutters, with emphasis. "So much for auxiliary power." No, wait, one light is still on: directly overhead, the independently powered flight recorder is blinking red. Waiting for a status report, last words, something.

Oh god.

Sabine breathes out. Not panicking is still part of her plan. "Well then," she says. "Everything is out except for the flight recorder. Without auxiliary power, air will run out in about ten minutes, unless I can release the mechanical valve of the oxygen tank. … Let's just hope nothing is burning."

Unfortunately, to even get to the oxygen tank, Sabine will have to unstrap from her seat, which is about the opposite of ideal, since she is still drifting at an estimated four hundred miles per hour through a debris field. Without shock absorbers.

Making any sorts of actual repairs on the ship under these circumstances will be impossible. Her best option, unfortunately, is to strap herself back in after she's sorted out the oxygen, and rely on that and her armour to save her from the worst of the collisions to come until help gets there.

Or maybe she'll just take longer to die.

"Okay," she says. "I'll probably get about one shot at this, so let's think how it's going to go." Talking to whichever anonymous person is going to have to listen to the flight recorder later on calms her down a bit. She takes one valuable minute just to think this through.

With the central computer out, the fighter's old-fashioned nuclear fission unit will default to a self-limiting atomic decay process. Some heat from that is radiated into the cabin, not enough to sustain the temperature, but will keep it from dropping to deadly for maybe eight hours.

Her armour will protect her from the worst effects of freezing for another two to three hours, probably. Thus, the limiting factor will be the fighter's oxygen tank. Without a functioning air recycling unit, it will run out in about nine, plus twenty or so minutes of oxygen provided by the armour.

Even as she reports this worst-case scenario for the flight recorder, she realises it's a tight schedule for Ketsu. She'll need to deliver the droids, turn around on the spot, wait for her at the rendezvous point, realise Sabine won't turn up, and come find her. It sounds frankly impossible.

"Well," she says. "First things first. Oxygen tank."

Sabine peels herself out of her seat and pushes off in zero gravity. Not even the light of distant stars reaches the small storage compartment behind her seat, and she feels for the oxygen valve with her gloved hands. Tries it ones, twice, the mechanism is stuck a little. On the third try she is relieved to hear a faint hiss –

Something hits the fighter sideways and it spirals away. Sabine is tumbling like a puppet. Her helmet takes most of the pounding, her armour decelerates her body's contortions, but between that and the sickening centrifugal forces pressing her into gnarly bits of the fighter's interior, this is probably it.

Drifting into unconsciousness, her thoughts get stuck on the last idea she had: Get back into the seat. Close the safety belt. Hope for help.

She's going to get back into that seat if it's the last thing she will do, and she does.

She closes the safety belt.

And with the last shred of her consciousness, she hopes for help.

But no-one is coming and she succumbs to darkness.

* * *

But someone came anyway, and it wasn't Ketsu.

Sabine's eyes fly open at this thought. On the opposite wall, the rising phoenix stares back at her. Something too new to understand right now.

What she wants to know is, does Ketsu have these dreams, too? Is she haunted by the memory of hearing nothing but static from the radio, by her decision to just fly away?

But that's not Ketsu's style.

Sabine is still lying motionless on her bed, convince her body that it's warm, that the air will not run out anytime soon, convince her brain to continue operating despite the stark unfairness of it all.

In the middle of this argument, there's _another_ knock on her door. She must admit it's a nice change from the Academy. All this knocking before entering.

Apart from that, she feels like rolling her eyes. Kanan again? So she might admit under pressure that yesterday's heart-to-heart hasn't been _completely_ unhelpful, but Sabine feels that she is quickly approaching the not very generous limits of her ability to open up. (She suspects Kanan has been stretching his, as well).

Also, he'll probably guess what she's dreamt. Damn Jedi.

"Come in," she says.

But no. This time, it's Hera in the doorframe, balancing a box of random rusty cans in one hand and a coffee in the other.

Oh god. She bets Hera has come to lay down the law with regard to Kanan. Hera has probably put that down on her to-do list this morning. Somewhere between _Repair the repulsors_ and _Calibrate the airlocks_ , there's a line saying _Explain to naive teenage girl that Kanan Jarrus is out of bounds_. Sabine cringes at the thought.

"I'm going for a run in a bit," she says, hoping that this will keep the conversation as short and painless as possible.

"Thought so," says Hera, not mentioning the fact that Sabine is still very much horizontal. "Wow, Kanan didn't lie. You really have an eye for colour."

She's standing in front of the mural that Sabine has completed over night. Took a while, but it certainly gave her opportunity to think all of this through.

"Nice flow," says Hera. "You know. Swirly. What is it, a phoenix in flight?"

"Kanan tipped you off, didn't he," says Sabine from somewhere underneath her blankets.

"Neither of us set out to be ornithologists," says Hera apologetically. "And yes, Sabine. We talk."

Sabine knows Hera is scrutinising her, so she may as well emerge. A bit. She probably has the galaxy's worst bed head. So what? She isn't out to impress anyone right now.

"I know you do," says Sabine. "About that –"

"He is worried about a remark you made yesterday," says Hera. "And I am, too." Her tone is firm, but also a lot more gentle than Sabine would have expected.

What could Kanan be worried about? she ponders. Something that Hera hadn't known before? Sabine's Imperial past? Her attempts to join Black Sun? Her knowledge of Order 66? Given the choices, it's probably wise to play stupid.

"What did he say I said?" she says.

"You asked him how he lived after what happened to him," says Hera. "Apparently, you said, and I quote, _I don't see how_."

So it's not only Hera who is extremely perceptive. It's both of them. Being a part of this crew is going to be _exhausting_.

"Sabine," says Hera. "You were talking about yourself, weren't you? What did you mean by that?"

Translation: Is it just teenage drama, or is she actually going off the rails? She's touched that they care.

And here's the difference, she realises belatedly: Ketsu would have ignored a remark like this. And Sabine would have ignored her ignoring this.

And that was how you ended up left for dead in a drifting ship. Sabine would have none of that again.

"I don't see how _right now_ ," says Sabine. "But I'm not giving up, either."

"And should you ever change your mind –" Hera continues.

"I don't think I will –"

"Should you ever change your mind," says Hera, "you come to us. We have your back against the galaxy, we have your back against yourself. Understood?"

Why does Sabine have the feeling Hera has had much the same conversation before?

Sabine lets her head sink back into the pillow. "'kay," she says, going full circle.

"That's good enough for now," says Hera after a small pause. "Well then, rise and shine. I thought you wanted to go for a run. It's only going to get hot later."

"Yes, mom," says Sabine, somewhat involuntarily. "Oh god." She rises, a bit, and Hera is _still_ in the doorframe, and suddenly Sabine has the impulse to bring up even the last possible source of fraction. It's probably because she's been an emotional teen for about a week now.

"So you talked to Kanan yesterday," Sabine says. "About me? And you're not -"

Hera cuts her off. "Oh, I'm not worried about any of that," she says, with a slight grin. "You share a ship with Kanan, you'll start wanting to clip him 'round the ears soon enough." She actually winks.

"Looking forward," mumbles Sabine. With some effort, she finally gets into an upright position. Her shoulder, where she smashed into the back of her pilot's seat a month ago, seems pretty okay today.

And Hera has still not left. She is again absorbed in the mural, her back to Sabine.

"We'll have to figure out what to do about this, of course," says Hera.

"It washes off," says Sabine miserably. So that's what's in Hera's box of rusty cans? Cleaning supplies? It's a pity, Sabine is starting to get attached to the phoenix design. The next iteration, she decides, will have to be even more stylised.

Maybe as a small middle finger to people who can't tell a phoenix from a duck.

"Yeah, no," says Hera. "I've got something for you. I was buying spare parts for the repulsors this morning, and this box here just caught my eye."

It turns out that Sabine has grossly mis-categorised the box that Hera has brought, and that it actually is full of spray paint cans, all at different points on the empty-to-full continuum. Turquoise, egg yolk yellow, hot pink, scarlet red, lime green, indigo blue, gold, silver, bronze, brilliant white, and dusky black. Sabine knows the brand, they're used for varnishing land gliders. Definitely _not_ washable. Her hands are itching to try them out.

"I thought you might want to paint something more permanent," says Hera. "Your room only, mind."

"And is that if I join the crew or –" says Sabine.

"Either way," says Hera. "Though do not kid yourself, this _is_ a bribe for you to stay."

"And you know," Hera adds, almost as an afterthought, "I only recruit people who have proven I can trust them. That includes Zeb, Chopper, Kanan – and you."

"Thank you, Hera," says Sabine, already weighing the can of scarlet in her hands. "I made my decision."


End file.
